Branded crown-cork.



No. 768,649. PATENTED AUG. 30, 1904.

E. H. BAARE. BRANDED GROWN CORK.

APPLICATION FILED OCT. 16, 1903.

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UNITED STATES Patented August 30, 1904.

PATENT OFFICE.

EDI/VIN H. BAARE, OF ST. LOUIS, MISSOURI, ASSIGN OR TO ARTHUR E. POSS OF ST. LOUIS, MISSOURI.

BRANDED CROWN-CORK.

SPECIFICATION forming part of Letters Patent No. 768,649, dated August 30, 1904:.

Application file-l October 16, 1903. Serial no. 177,234. (No model.)

To a, ZU/l/077t it may concern:

Be it known that I, EDWIN H. BAARE, a citizen of the United States, residing at the city of St. Louis, in the State of Missouri, have invented certain new and useful Improvements in Branded Crown-Corks, of which the following is a specification.

This invention consists of a new article of manufacture. The article of manufacture is a branded crown-cork.

In the drawings, Figure 1 is atop plan view of a crown-cork. Fig. 2 is a side elevation of the same. Fig. 3 is a bottom plan view thereof, and Fig. 4 is a sectional view taken through the middle of the same.

Crown-corks are now a well-known article and commonly used by bottlers for topping or stoppering bottles in lieu of the long cylindrical corks formerly in use for that purpose. Their general character is indicated in the drawings, in which 1 is the metal back having the fluted flange 2, and fastened within said flange portion and extending to the edges thereof at all points and resting against the metal back .portion 1 is the cork disk 3. By suitable machinery the corrugated or fluted edge of the flange 2 is pressed down and bent inward, so as to overlap and take hold of the bead or lip formed adjacent to the mouth of the bottle.

Bottlers have heretofore found it desirable to have some mark upon or-about the bottles of their product to indicate the date when the beer or other article was placed in the bottle, and to that end they have sometimes perforated the labels pasted on the bottles, suitable perforating apparatus thus printing the date of bottling in the labels, and, again, they have by suitable machinery branded the oldstyle long cylindrical corks heretofore mentioned. With the introduction of the crownco'rk in recent years, however, it has become impossible to brand the corks or stoppers used in connection with the bottles, because the crown-cork is of. an entirely difierent style and nature from the long corks, and such a thing as a branded crown-cork has heretofore been unknown. As the crown-cork is an entirely separate and distinct article from the long cylindrical cork of the old style, so, also,

is a branded crown-cork a separate and distinct article from a branded old-style stopper. This is evident from the fact that crown-corks have now been in use for a number of years unbranded, although it is the desire of every bottler to have some brand on his corks to indicate the date of bottling in order that he may determine the justice of claims for allowances because of alleged deterioration of the beer or other article within the bottle. This invention therefore resides in the production of a new article of manufacture, which article is a branded crown-cork.

The branding on the cork is shown in Fig. 3 at 4, indicating the date when the bottle stoppered with the particular crown-cork so branded was bottled.

I have filed two applications for patent sep-- arate from this, one for the machine I use in branding crown-corks and also for a carbureter forming part of same, said applications being filed on the same date as this present application. I also reserve to myself the right and privilege later to file an application for patent for the process of branding crowncorks hereinafter described.

The difliculty that has heretofore stood in the Way of branding crown-corks has been that it has been impossible so to feed the crown-corks that the inner or cork sidez'. c. the side to be branded-would or could be presented to the impact of the brandingiron. In the branding of the ordinary and old-style corks all that is necessary is that the same shall be fed into such position that the branding-iron shall come in contact with them. This is easily done, because it is immaterial on which side of such a cork the brand is placed. One side of the crown-cork being tin and having ornamental marks of some kind usually placed thereon advertising the product of the particular bottler using same and being of tin, so as not to be adapted to receive the mark of a branding-iron, and the inside of said cap being lined with cork, as hereinbefore described, and being thus particularly adapted to be marked by a branding-iron, it is all important in branding process a practical one for business purposes.

Accordingly in order that the crown-corks may be fed rapidly and continuously and in numbers suflicient for commercial purposes 1 have invented a process of branding crowncorks whereby they may be branded by machinery. to describe.

My said process of branding crown-corks consists in throwing same indiscriminately into a receptacle without regard to the way in which same face, and next in sharply impacting at any point of its circumference the inner side of the flange of the crown-cork which protrudes over the cork disk, by which impact the crown-cork is caused to turn a somersault and thereafter to feed with its inside or cork side faced in a predetermined direc- This process I shall now proceed tion. \Vithout such impact a large proportion of corks in the above-mentioncd receptacle would not face in the right direction naturally. So far as those that do are concerned, they feed automatically Without further care; but the practical conditions of the art require that all shall face in the same direction, and this process consists in' the dis covery of how automatically to face them all the right way to be fed in the right Way to be branded in order that crown-corks may be branded on a commercial scale.

Having thus described my said invention, what I claim, and desire to secure by Letters Patent, is-

1. A crown-cork having matter branded on the cork disk thereof.

2. A crown cork having dating-matter branded on the cork disk thereof.

3. A crown-cork having matter branded on the concave side thereof.

In testimony whereof I have affixed my signature, in'presence of two witnesses, this 28th day of September, 1903.

. EDWIN H. BAARE.

Witnesses:

GLADYs WVALToN, MAUI) E. LETOI-IER. 

